19056

HSC: 1916 Jack Dunn Signed Contract, Babe Ruth PS

Currency:USD Category:Sports - Cards & Fan Shop / Sports - Autographs (Original) Start Price:1.00 USD Estimated At:1,500.00 - 2,000.00 USD
HSC: 1916 Jack Dunn Signed Contract, Babe Ruth PS
<B>1916 Agreement between Baltimore Orioles and New York Yankees Signed by Jack Dunn--Gave "Babe" Ruth his Nickname!</B></I> It's a common misconception that it was George Herman Ruth's boyish face that earned him the most famous moniker in sporting history, but the true story is well established in baseball lore. It was the man who signed Ruth to his first professional contract, actually assuming legal guardianship for young George Herman from St. Mary's Industrial School for Boys to do so, that led the Orioles manager's players to call their new teammate "Jack's Babe." Yet despite this profound relevance to the Babe Ruth story, both in terms of his role in re-christening the boy who would be King and in bringing him into the world of organized baseball, Jack Dunn remains absent in all but the most sophisticated Babe Ruth collections. There are reasons for this, of course. Most notably, the man who signed the greatest baseball player of all time for six-hundred dollars passed away at age fifty-six in 1928, leaving a microscopic supply of specimens to survive the ages between then and now. And while Dunn did see eight seasons of action in the Major Leagues as a member of the Dodgers and Giants (1897-1904), he spent the majority of his baseball life in lesser leagues, from whence few autographs were requested in the first place. And so Heritage Sports Collectibles is thrilled to present this exceptionally scarce representation of this important autograph, which, in the happiest of coincidences, finds itself on an agreement transferring one of Dunn's Orioles to the team that the Babe would come to define, the New York Yankees. The four-page document, dated March 20th, 1916, regards the employment of a ballplayer named Ford Meadows, and is signed at the bottom of page two "Baltimore Base Ball & Ex. Co., John Dunn." Directly below is the signature of Yankees president Jacob Ruppert, who has imprinted the document with his corporate seal. The ink remains in marvelous 7/10 to 8/10 condition, while the document itself grades a legitimate NRMT. An unsigned companion piece relevant to Meadows' transfer is equally fine. A search of auction results from the major houses yields not a single instance of this signature having sold in the past five years, so serious collectors take note--your first chance at owning one may also be your last. <I>LOA from Steve Grad & Zach Rullo/ PSA DNA.</B></I>